Justia U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

The bar, popular with the college crowd, lost its liquor license after several altercations between employees and customers required police intervention. Wis. Stat. 125.12(2)(ag)(2), provides that a liquor license can be revoked or suspended if the holder "keeps or maintains a disorderly or riotous, indecent or improper house." The district court rejected an argument that the law was unconstitutionally vague. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. In light of the incidents that occurred at the bar, it was an "unlikely candidate" to bring a successful "as applied" challenge and the law is constitutional on its face.

Penske provided transportation services for a newspaper, its only customer, 1999 to 2009, but lost the bid for the contract and informed the union that it would cease operations. The collective bargaining agreement expired two days after operations shut down. Penske and the union engaged in "effects bargaining." Penske agreed to give workers extended recall rights, preferential treatment should they apply for employment at other firms within the Penske group, pay for unused vacation time, severance pay of one week's wages, and assistance in preparing resumes and securing letters of recommendation. Employees filed claims they characterized as a "hybrid" breach of contract and Labor-Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. 185 suit. The Seventh Circuit agreed with the district court that the suit was "doomed" because the plaintiffs did not even contend that Penske failed to implement the collective bargaining agreement. The court also dismissed a claim that the union did not bargain hard enough.

Defendant pleaded guilty to traveling in interstate commerce to engage in sexual conduct with a minor, 18 U.S.C. 2423, and was first sentenced to 240 months' imprisonment with 10 years of supervised release, despite a guidelines range of 57-71 months. The court based the sentence on presumed prior acts by defendant and an unsupported assumption of recidivism. On remand, the district court again imposed a sentence of 240 months, despite the guidelines range and a government recommendation of 71 months, and added a lifetime term of supervised release. The Seventh Circuit again vacated and remanded. Although the district judge avoided the errors committed at the first sentencing, he did not give adequate reasons for the sentence.

In 2002 Bell established mutual funds and raised about $2.5 billion for investment. Most of the firms to which the funds routed money were controlled by Petters. He was running a Ponzi scheme. There was no inventory. New investments paid older debts, with some money siphoned off for personal use. When Petters was caught in 2008, the funds collapsed; about 60% of the money was gone. The funds' bankruptcy trustee filed suit against the funds' auditor, alleging negligence. The district court dismissed without deciding whether the auditor had acted competently, invoking the doctrine of in pari delicto, based on Bell's knowledge of the scheme. The Seventh Circuit vacated, noting that Bell was not stealing funds and that the extent of his knowledge cannot be determined at this stage. An allegation that Bell was negligent but not criminally culpable in 2006 and 2007 makes the claim against the auditor sufficient.

In 2011 the court vacated a rule issued by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration about the use of electronic monitoring devices in commercial trucks. Petitioners, commercial truck drivers, sought attorneys’ fees and costs under the Equal Access to Justice Act 28 U.S.C. 2412. The other party, Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, was not included in the petition, but was the only party responsible for paying the fees. The EAJA defines a party eligible for an award as “an individual whose net worth did not exceed $2,000,000” or an “organization, the net worth of which did not exceed $7,000,000.” The Seventh Circuit denied fees. The absence of OOIDA from the petition indicates that it is not eligible for fees. Even if the petitioners did not have an explicit fee arrangement among themselves, their fee arrangements with the same law firm, which had represented OOIDA for over 20 years, resulted in an implicit arrangement whereby the organization paid all fees and costs and the individual drivers were not responsible for any payment. The purpose of the EAJA would not be served by awarding fees to the individuals. Financial considerations would not have deterred them from pursuing this action. .

Petitioner, then 45 years old and having previously worked in a factory and as a health aid, applied for disability benefits in 2004, claiming an onset date in 2004. Her conditions include peripheral vascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, osteoarthritis, obesity, vascular dementia, depression, panic disorder, and anxiety. The Social Security Appeals Council denied review of the ALJ's adverse decision. The Seventh Circuit reversed and remanded. The ALJ failed to adequately consider petitioner's mental impairments, her obesity, and several of her physical problems.

For more than 30 years, Blue was an administrative assistant at IBEW and had an excellent record. In 2006 Phillips filed a complaint against IBEW, alleging that his information was removed from the referral book and his initiation fee returned because of his race (African-American). Around the same time, Blue questioned a supervisor about a white electrician, allowed to sign the referral book without paying his initiation fee. Blue was stripped of essential job duties, denied over- time opportunities, and subjected to a hostile work environment. She was disciplined for minor infractions, suspended without pay, and had to take leave to escape the stress. She filed her own complaint with the local agency, alleging retaliation. The district court denied a motion to exclude documents relating to Phillips's complaint. A jury awarded Blue $202,396.76. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, finding the documents relevant and the evidence sufficient to sustain the verdict.

A friend of defendant told Sergeant Wilson that he had seen sexual images of young girls on defendant's cell phone, and that defendant, 21 years old, had bragged about having sex with them. The friend later texted Wilson that he and defendant were together in a car. Wilson stopped the car and seized defendant's phone, but did not immediately apply for a search warrant. He sent a report to Detective Krug, who worked with the FBI Cyber Crimes Task Force. Krug tried to contact Wilson for more details, but shift differences and other delays resulted in a six-day gap before Krug obtained a federal warrant, searched the phone, and found the images. The district court denied a motion to suppress, finding the delay not unreasonable, and that, if were unreasonable, the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule would apply. Defendant entered a conditional plea of guilty to receiving child pornography, 18 U.S.C. 2252(a)(2), and was sentenced to 210 months in prison. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. While the officers did not act with perfect diligence, the delay was not so egregious as to render the search and seizure unreasonable.